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Topic: Purchasing Queen Stock (Read 1821 times)

I've been a little involved with dogs and dog breeding, so my perspective on animal (insect) breeding tends to come from that back ground. In our area, you typically buy 3 #s of bees with a queen for $85.00 and start from there. Not much thought is given into the "line" of stock. It's either an Italian or Carnie Queen, that is included in the 3 # purchase. Your package of bees comes from California or Texas from a bee packager, who you don't really know or know well.

After reading some of the material posted, it seems that a better approach might be taken in selecting your queen and creating a "foundation" stock. Even, with "natural breeding", some efforts can be made to improve your "line" of bees over time.

After a short search on the net, I found several sources of queens, that are specifically produced for sale to "Queen Breeders". These queens are costly (~$100.00) and advertised as having special traits.

Assuming that you wanted to consider producing your own "line" of queens .... for your own use and environment........ how best to start? (You can always start using the concept of hybrid vigor, if nothing else.)

I have wondered how many people would like to breed there own stock. I'd like to do that myself. In my area, I see mating yards every where. Just noticed another one yesterday about 2 miles down the road. other stock is available in California. They just don't seem to advertise it, one must ask.

The breeder queens you saw are generally purchased by people who are producing lots of queens for sale and can justify the expense. I think a lot of people are thinking along the same lines as you(myself included) with regard to breeding your own stock. I'm tracking down queen breeders to requeen the packages I'm getting this year. As far as what stock to use, I guess that depends on what your looking for. For me I'm looking for queen breeders in a similar climate, as well as those that don't treat(at least for Varroa). Hopefully using such "survivor" stock from four or five different breeders will allow me to be producing my own locally adapted queens within the next 5 to 10 years.

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For $100 you get to inspect the queen in her hive before you buy. That way you see what kind of hive she comes from and the young she might make. But the drones you have will influence the queens you make.

I'm hoping to move soon to an area that is fairly rural and a bit off of the beaten path. I don't know that I could say that it's isolated, but it's somewhat remote. This may minimize the influence of crossing with unwanted drones, but there will still be that opportunity. Feral bees could be a problem. The best I can hope for is to flood the area with my own drones deliberately and improve my odds.

The question I'm trying to answer is how best how to start. Because I live in a colder north climate, I'd probable start using queens from breeder in the north. Do I focus on starting with"surviror" stock? Or Hygenic stock ? Or VSH stock? Some of this maybe asnwered if I actually decided what it is that I really want to accomplish. (i.e. What is the objective of the project?)

I was hoping that someone could provide me some insight on how best to start. Howfully, someone has been down this road and provide some advise on what to avoid and what to consider worthy of some effort.